What Stress Does to the Body
When we are experiencing stress we can become hyper vigilant to things outside of us that cause us to be wary. If this external stress continues for too long, our body responds by continuously pumping the hormones of adrenaline and cortisol through our bodies. These two hormones are what keep us in an activated state that allows us to fight any threat or run away if needed. In the short terms we want these hormones to be activated so we can escape the threat we are experiencing. Long term exposure however can leave us inflamed and depleted, fatigued, irritable and more prone to infection. In fact, when we are in the fight, flight, freeze mode of activation our immune, reproductive and digestive systems go offline so as to shunt priority to our cardiovascular and musculoskeletal systems. Again, in an acute (short term) situation this is great. But long term this can make us susceptible to viral and bacterial infections.
One of the things we can learn throughout our current state of affairs is what is in our control and what is not. Believe it or not, we have the tools to help us manage our stress responses. This IS in our control. It takes practice, but the good news is that it can be learned.
Now is not the time to recreate the wheel, but to tap into the resources that already exist. To that end I would like to introduce a few of my favorite apps to help with stress and anxiety.
The Tapping Solution
The Tapping Solution is an app with two tiers of content. The free tier teaches users how to follow along with tapping script. It has a lighted map of places to tap on your body that represent acupressure points. This is a guided meditation that also allows the user to be active rather than quieting the mind and focusing on clearing the mind.
The beauty of this type of meditation is that it encourages you to identify HOW you are presently feeling. You can name your feelings even if they are “negative” and allow yourself to feel into your feelings. But don’t worry, you won’t stay there. The already prepared scripts guide you through stages of naming your feelings, expressing desire to shift those feelings to something more helpful, doubt about your success in changing, realization that you do indeed want to change and finally choosing to change. The choice involves intention in changing your language and how you speak about your current situation.
The paid version opens up additional prepared scripts that include pain relief, grief, anxiety, stress, weight loss, craving cessation among myriad others.
The reason I enjoy this app so much is that it allows me to express my feelings. It doesn’t start with positive attitude. It allows you to be human and real. But then it guides you in a new way of thinking and speaking about your situation to a place where it becomes more adaptive and helpful. It helps me shift out of stuck thinking.
This week Nick and Jessica Ortner, brother and sister who are the face of this app, have opened up many new meditations that are specific to the current Covid-19 pandemic. Always innovators and timely in their presentations. Give it a try and see what you think.
Inner Balance
Inner Balance is a biofeedback device that helps you learn how to recognize what your baseline body response is to day to day experiences. It measures heart rate variability via an ear clip that takes your pulse. The app guides you to breathe in synch with a mandala that expands and contracts similar to your lungs as you inhale and exhale. When you are breathing in a rhythmic fashion your body receives a signal that you are safe and your threat system gets a signal of safety, thus reducing your overall stress level.
This app gives you a red light if your body is reacting in an out of synch way. Blue light when your pulse rate is improving and a green light when you are in “coherence.” “Coherence is the state when the heart, mind and emotions are in energetic alignment and cooperation,” according to HeartMath the apps developers.
Once you get the hang of using the app HeartMath has an added level of breathing and cultivation of emotion that helps you shift out of stuck and chaotic mind space. Typical instructions are to :
Focus on breathing through your heart space. Inhale and exhale as if in the region of your heart
Activate an emotional experience of care or nurturance. Think of someone or something you care for and begin to generate the emotional experience related to that care or nurturance.
Radiate that renewed feeling into the world. Breathe that sense of care through your heart space out into the world.
Focus, Activate, Radiate
HeartMath has other tools for shifting negative mindsets and teaching acceptance for reality as it is, but this is a good starting point. Research shows that we can have a direct effect on our biology by practicing skills such as intentioned breathing and emotional shifting.
Global Coherence app
Also from the creators of HeartMath is another app that harnesses the practice of Coherent Breathing in a communal form. The Global Coherence app is leading the charge to create a space where meditators, prayer and users of their mindful apps can come together with a singular intention of healing the world. Before you scoff, they have done research built up research suggesting that prayer across distance is effective in the healing of those receiving prayer. For further reading please check here.
During the current Coronavirus, the Global Coherence community is inviting people to participate in scheduled Wednesday guided meditations for the global community to heal from our current state. For folks who find themselves in shelter in place situations this can become a way that you can help humanity heal from our current viral load without putting yourself at risk. This is a low risk way to DO Something to benefit everyone. You don’t need the Inner Balance app. You can choose to just follow the guided meditation while practicing your slow and deliberate breathing as outlined above.